[npm] 1. What is NPM?

• NPM

1. Define

- npm(node package manager) is a default package manager for the Javascript runtime environment   Node.js

- As of Node.js version 0.6.3 NPM is bundled and installed automatically with the environment

- NPM runs through the command line and manages dependencies for an application 

2. About

- Once you're depending on this code from other developers, npm makes it really easy to check to see if they've made any updates to it, and to download those updates when they're made

- It's a way to reuse code from other developers, and also a way to share your code with them, and it makes it easy to manage the different versions of code

3. package.json

- These bits of reusable code are called packages, or sometimes modules.

- A package is just a directory with one or more files in it, that also has a filed called "package.json" with some meta data about this package 

- A typical application such as a website, will depend on dozens or hundreds of packages

4. packages

- You can find packages to help you build your application by browsing the npm web site